Mariners' 2026 survival could depend on fixing major offensive flaw from 2025

It feels weird to enter a new season feeling not just confident in a Seattle Mariners offense, but excited. This is, after all, a team that didn't rank higher than seventh in the AL in scoring between 2017 and 2024.

The Mariners jumped to fourth in the Junior Circuit in scoring last year, and there was more than just one thing driving the improvement. The team's 238 home runs were the third-most in MLB. but the M's were also third in stolen bases and top-10 in walks.

There are nonetheless reasons to be worried about a potential offensive downturn in 2026, for which the big one relates to the power front.

Jorge Polanco and Eugenio Suárez are gone. And while Cal Raleigh, Julio Rodríguez and Randy Arozarena have 30-homer potential, nobody should be expecting another 60-homer season from "Big Dumper." Apart from those guys, nobody else on the projected roster could so much as challenge 20 homers.

If the pitching reverts to its 2024 form, any downturn by the offense probably isn't going to get noticed. But just in case, we'd like to call attention to an area for improvement: situational hitting.

Mariners need to get better at doing the little things on offense in 2026

Truthfully? Situational hitting is overrated. As much as everyone likes a little "get 'em on, get 'em over, get 'em in" action when it happens, Babe Ruth proved that home runs are more efficient over a century ago.

That said, nobody in Seattle wants to see a repeat of these stats in 2026:

• AVG with Runners in Scoring Position: .235 (26th in MLB)
• Productive Outs Percentage: 24.7 (30th in MLB)

Both of these are a "yikes," and particularly the RISP average. It's never a good thing when it's a surprise when a team actually converts with a runner in scoring position, and that was pretty much the daily reality for the Mariners in 2025.

As for the productive outs, nobody in their right mind is going to say, "Actually, the Mariners should bunt more." But little things can matter, especially in games when baserunners are at a premium. In those, it helps to have more than one tool in the toolshed.

The whole offense doesn't need to get in on better situational hitting this year. For their parts, you want Raleigh, Julio and Arozarena swinging as hard as they can in search of extra-base power. You also want the latter two to take off for second base if they get to first.

What could be key, though, is having Brendan Donovan and Josh Naylor around for the whole year.

Their reputations as guys who grind tough at-bats are well warranted, specifically to the extent that both were in the top 10 percent of all hitters with their strikeout rates in 2025. But they're also smart hitters who excel in the very areas where the Mariners struggled last season:

With their help, you can see a scenario in which the Mariners' 2026 offense resembles the offense that propelled the Toronto Blue Jays to the World Series in 2025. Toronto's offense could hit the long ball just fine, but just as key was how non-wasteful it was. To wit, it led MLB with a .292 average with runners in scoring position and was fifth in productive out rate.

Granted, what would also help in 2026 is if the Mariners simply got better at hitting at T-Mobile Park. They had a .702 OPS in home games, the 22nd-highest in MLB. On the road, their .776 OPS was second-highest in MLB.

But since suppressed offense has long come with the territory at T-Mobile Park, Mariners hitters are better off worrying about things they can actually control. And to this end, a little less reliance on the long ball could go a long way.